Paula felt a swell of pity for the man. What a miserable, exposing business mating rituals could be. She glanced around the room and wondered if the solitary individuals were waiting here for their dating app prospects and if the awkward couples had arranged to meet via a dating site but things weren’t going well. Paula knew the basics of the current dating world, thanks to her patients’ stories and the media, plus Anita’s vivid tales of misadventure, but it was all so far from Paula’s own experience, she felt like a naive observer from another era. Early on, she’d had two proper boyfriends—one at school and one in her first year at university—but soon after that, she and Remy became a couple, when they were both only twenty. Which meant Paula had never had to deal with the shuddering vulnerability of the whole dating palaver.

She made the beer last for twenty minutes, then headed to the ladies so she could survey other corners of the bar on the way there and back. She couldn’t see Santino anywhere.

She bought a second beer, read a few articles on her phone, scanning the tables and booths every now and then, as if looking for someone she knew. After another fifteen minutes with no sign of Santino, she gave up and walked out into the street.

Maybe he’d stopped coming to this bar. Maybe this whole idea was a stupid mistake.

The following night, she went back to Protozoa. She wore the same outfit but with a different top so her return appearance might be less obvious. This time she chose a corner booth which offered a good view of most areas of the bar. She held her phone to her ear, nodding and murmuring as if in the middle of a call, while she discreetly scanned the faces of the patrons.

When her gaze swept past the fire exit, she spotted him. John Santino. Sitting on his own in one of the booths. Wearing jeans and a polo shirt rather than the suits he’d worn in the TV footage, but it was definitely him.

Paula felt the whoosh of adrenaline through her chest, making her skin prickle, but it was hard to interpret her fight-or-flight response. Was it an aggressive urge to attack this predator? Was it a fear response—the instinct to flee a dangerous man? Or was it panic about her own potential actions? The function of her sympathetic nervous system was too primitive to offer much high-level interpretation. Whatever was going on, she wanted to override instinct and take control of the process.